title: External validity and reliability of the Psychosocial Assessment Tool (PAT) among Canadian parents of children newly diagnosed with cancer.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  The Psychosocial Screening Tool (PAT) was developed and validated with a sample of caregivers of children newly diagnosed with cancer in the United States. This study aimed to assess cultural adaptation (Phase 1) and validity and reliability of the revised PAT (PATrev) with a Canadian sample (Phase 2).
  
  
  METHODS
  In Phase 1, a convenience sample of seven parents of children who were treated for cancer and six pediatric oncology healthcare experts participated. In Phase 2, 67 parents of children newly diagnosed with cancer from 4 Canadian pediatric cancer centers participated. To assess reliability and validity of the PATrev, parents completed behavioral (BASC-2) and quality of life (PedsQL) instruments about the child and an anxiety inventory (STAI) about themselves.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The PAT required minor changes to be culturally adapted for the Canadian population. The PATrev had strong inter-rater (0.77) test-retest (0.75), and internal consistency reliability (0.85), as well as moderate to strong validity comparing PATrev child's problems and PedsQL total (-0.49), PedsQL anxiety (-0.47), BASC-2 internalizing (0.64), behavioral (0.63), and adaptive scores (-0.56). PATrev discriminative validity was confirmed with BASC-2 scores (AUR scores of 0.70-0.74). PATrev parental stressors were strongly correlated to STAI scores (0.53). Finally, agreement between PATrev child's problems and parental anxiety scores was moderate (0.47).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  This study supports the original PAT, demonstrates PATrev is a reliable and valid psychosocial screening tool, and provides unique evidence regarding early psychosocial risk in the family, which have important implications for guiding psychosocial practice.
authors.affiliation: The Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto, Ontario, Canada; University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Barrera
authors.forename: K
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Hancock
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Rokeach
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Cataudella
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Atenafu
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Johnston
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Punnett
authors.forename: P C
authors.initials: PC
authors.lastname: Nathan
authors.forename: U
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Bartels
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Silva
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Cassidy
authors.forename: P
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Jansen
authors.forename: W
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Shama
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Greenberg
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D019540:Area Under Curve; D002170:Canada; D017028:Caregivers / Q000523:psychology*; D002648:Child; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000523:psychology*; D010290:Parents / Q000523:psychology*; D011594:Psychometrics / Q000295:instrumentation*; D012372:ROC Curve; D015203:Reproducibility of Results
keywords: early psychosocial identification; pediatric cancer; reliable and valid screening tool